Just to give everyone a quick heads up...no I did not die. My project is alive and well, albeit slightly dusty. I just moved and started a new job two weeks ago, so things are finally starting to settle in (minus the bazillion boxes still laying around). I fully plan to update this weekend or the upcoming week. Stay tuned!
When I read update 26th in the title I was happy then I realised it was last month.Don't worry we are still waiting patiently.
new job, means different tools right? Is this for the better or will there be a down grade in ability of machine tools you can use.
Actually, I work in an office now, so that means zero access to machines and tools. I'm going to keep a good relationship with my former boss so I can maybe use the machine shop once and a while. Either way, I'm finished with all of the CNC work, it's just sanding from here on out!
^ Haha well that was good timing Wouldn't want to change jobs before you finish with all the tools Good luck with the new job............we all have to leave the tools (though never willingly) sooner or later to climb the corporate ladder
No more re-dos. You MUST finish it now. It's kinda sad we wont see any more billet porn from you, but at least you won't get trapped in the hell of constant revision.
Ah it wasn't so bad. Only two major things, and one was out of my control (possessed CNC). I swear you'll like the finished product .
We will like the finished product once IT IS FINISHED. I just went through the better part of this log and there has been some sweet work done here.
I'm back! Well, sort of. These are old pictures I never got around to posting. The first thing I wanted to share with you is the fairly complex fixturing system I had to set up to do the outer shell. To secure the very heavy, large pieces of aluminum and acrylic down so the tool doesn't send the piece flying, I bolted the piece from underneath. First, I had to find a fixture plate large enough. How about this piece? How big is it exactly? It's big . So what I do is drill holes in this bottom plate, counter-bore the underneath, and put bolts up through the bottom of the plate. Here's the bolts. Threaded through the underneath, they're nice and flush, even a bit recessed. These bolts go into another plate of aluminum, shown below. This piece is roughly the same size of the acrylic and aluminum pieces. Another set of screws (the lighter ones) go through this piece, and screw into the top aluminum piece...mimicking the stainless steel holding rods I made. As you can see, it's essentially a layering system. The way the fixturing is put together is backwards from the way I described it (acrylic held onto top aluminum, that screwed to the next aluminum piece, and that bolted to the bottom piece). The reason I needed that second fixture plate was because of the depth of the ball end mill, and how it goes beyond the depth of the acrylic piece, essentially into the plane of the fituring piece. Confusing, yes. Effective, definitely. So what should I use to chop this beast? Either one of these will do. I love these tools. On another note...I had a bit of a dilemma. I bought a nicer northbridge heatsink for my motherboard. I didn't like the crappy aluminum one that came stock with the Zotac, so I went for a generic copper one. Boo stock heatsink! Hooray copper! Smooth and shiny! For those of you familiar with this heatsink, it comes with several different mounts for different northbridge configurations. The only difference is essentially the width of the mounting holes. Problem is, the heatsink mounting piece runs into the SATA port (and the little chip). Sad. In order to combat this problem, I had to brainstorm for a bit. I'll leave you to wonder where I went with my idea. What would you have done?
personally i would have chopped the outer ring to allow for it to pass the sata port, as its supported across the middle. However you seem to have had a decent workshop to use, so mill and new mount!
You could pretty much remove the entire outer ring and it would still mount successfully. Personally I would mill a new mounting bracket without the ring and a wider cross piece.
Pretty close to what I actually did. The problem with designing and milling a new mount was a) lack of time and b) the thin mid-section is so small it would be fairly hard to mill. Here's what I did. I took one of the other mounts, the one that I didn't need to fit on my board, and gouged the sides. On top of this will rest the blue mount, the one with the right hole width. Simple, and it works. Looks good too, considering you can't even see the orange mount underneath the blue one.
Not familiar with that heat sink. Who makes it? I like it! Once again awesome project you got here. I 'bout crap'd my pants when I saw the big material sandwich.
